B’nai B’rith International wrote a letter to The Heinz Endowments to express dismay and deep concern about a grant the Endowments made to a restaurant in Pittsburgh bundling anti-Israel propaganda with food from “Palestine,” which the restaurant describes as being “in conflict” with the United States. The Heinz Endowments gave the restaurant—named Conflict Kitchen—a $50,000 grant. B’nai B’rith International President Allan J. Jacobs and Executive Vice President Daniel S. Mariaschin wrote to the Endowments noting that Conflict Kitchen was a deeply unsettling choice for a grant when one considers the work of Conflict Kitchen is antithetical to the stated mission of The Heinz Endowments. In a letter responding to B’nai B’rith’s concerns, The Heinz Endowments President Grant Oliphant wrote: “I want to be especially clear that its current program on Palestine was not funded by the endowments and we would not fund such a program, precisely because it appears to be terribly at odds with the mission of promoting understanding.” Oliphant also wrote that “[the Endowments] emphatically does not agree with or support either the anti-Israel sentiments quoted on Conflict Kitchen’s food wrappers or the program’s refusal to incorporate Israeli or Jewish voices in its material.” The letter also notes that “Conflict Kitchen has received no additional funding from the Endowments since the one grant last year and is not expected to.” We commend the Endowments for its quick response and for clearly stating that a divisive group such as Conflict Kitchen is not the sort of grantee that works to promote understanding and tolerance. The effort to demonize and delegitimize Israel takes many forms. Conflict Kitchen has brought it to the lunch counter and B’nai B’rith hopes that The Heinz Endowments board will be far more vigilant in vetting future applicants. A public disavowal by the Endowments of this particular grant recipient could be an instructive and powerful tool.

Fulvio Martusciello (left) and Bas Belder (right) with Jerusalem in the background

Member of the European Parliament and newly appointed Chair of the European Parliament Delegation for relations with Israel Fulvio Martusciello, a Christian Democrat from Italy, visited Israel this week for the first time at the invitation of B’nai B’rith International. Joining Martusciello on the trip was MEP and previous delegation chair Bas Belder, a European Conservative from the Netherlands.The two day visit was prepared in tandem by the B’nai B’rith International EU Affairs Office in Brussels and the B’nai B’rith World Center in Jerusalem. The delegation met with the Israeli Deputy Foreign Minister Tzachi Hanegbi; MK and Chair of the Economic Affairs Committee Avishay Braverman; MK and Chair of the Foreign Affairs and Defense Committee Zeev Elkin; and MK and Chair of Knesset Lobby for the Struggle Against Anti-Semitism Shimon Ohayon. The delegation also met with the Head of the Bureau of the European Division of the Israeli Ministry of Foreign Affairs Shmuel Revel. Major issues raised during the meetings included EU-Israel relations, the Iranian threat and the latest on anti-Semitism throughout Europe.The delegation also visited Yad Vashem and the Old City of Jerusalem. “Unfortunately people don’t know what they are talking when they talk about Israel,” Martusciello said. “This visit was an eye opener for a country that I always have the will to visit.” During the meetings Martusciello mentioned the importance of Holocaust education in Europe and, in particular, the need for accurate information about the real situation in Israel.

World Center Director Alan Schneider and Director for EU Affairs Nuno Wahnon, who accompanied the MEPs on the visit, noted the importance of having leading EU political figures dealing with EU-Israel relations visit Israel early in their tenure. The visit laid the foundation for a future cooperation between B’nai B’rith and the European Parliament Delegation for relations with Israel.

The Associated Press recently reported that many suspected Nazi war criminals who once lived in the United States and faced investigation by the Justice Department continue to collect Social Security payments through a legal loophole, despite having left the country and renounced their U.S. citizenship. B’nai B’rith International supports changing the law to close this loophole and deny Social Security to such individuals. We are pleased that members in both chambers of Congress have announced their intentions to introduce bipartisan legislation to address this problem. Since moving abroad, these former Nazis have lived undisturbed lives, collecting additional entitlements from the governments of the countries in which they reside. B’nai B’rith urges these governments to cease providing benefits to such individuals and force them to stand trial. The Human Rights and Special Prosecutions Section, a unit within the Justice Department formerly referred to as the Office of Special Investigations (OSI), has done exceptional work since its inception to remove Nazi war criminals from the U.S. We commend this office for the vital work it has done in helping to bring these individuals to justice, including deporting many of them to countries where they should be subject to prosecution.However, the reason these suspected Nazis collected—and continue to collect—Social Security checks has to do with the specific process through which they were removed from the country. Current U.S. law, unfortunately, strips benefits only from those suspected war criminals who are deported—not from those who abandon their U.S. citizenship and leave the country before the deportation process concludes. In order to expedite the process of ridding this country of those Nazi criminals living in our midst, individuals under investigation by the OSI were, at times, permitted to renounce their citizenship and leave the country. It is disturbing that, upon returning to the countries from which they originated, many of these individuals were never prosecuted for war crimes—a highly negative reflection on the governments they live under.

For too long these Nazi perpetrators have been able to collect Social Security from the U.S. government—as well as a variety of social welfare benefits from their native countries—all the while living comfortably and successfully avoiding punishment for their crimes.

A change in the law would deprive Social Security benefits from those who left the country and renounced their citizenship as the result of an OSI investigation. These former Nazis are no more deserving of Social Security benefits than those whom the U.S. actually deported.

B’nai B’rith International condemns the attack on a light-rail station in northern Jerusalem by a Palestinian man with Hamas ties that killed an infant and wounded eight others. Yesterday, Abd al-Rahman al-Shaloudy drove his car off the road, across the light-rail tracks and toward the station into a crowd, striking waiting passengers and killing a 3-month-old baby. Shaloudy then took off on foot and was fatally shot by police. According to a police spokesperson, surveillance footage indicates Shaloudy intended to strike the crowd waiting for a train. In the aftermath it was also widely reported Shaloudy is linked to Hamas and has a history of anti-Israel violence. At a time when more attention is being paid to acts of terrorism, we are deeply concerned over the lack of international outcry following this incident. This is yet another example of the constant threat faced by Israel and Israelis from terrorist organizations and their followers.

B’nai B’rith International expressed deep sympathy and condolences in a letter to Canadian Prime Minister Stephen Harper following a gunman’s attack on the Canadian parliament and the fatal shooting of a soldier nearby. On the morning of Oct. 22, a gunman shot dead a soldier guarding the National War Memorial in central Ottawa. Shortly after, he entered the Canadian parliament building firing his weapon, until he was fatally shot by police. B’nai B’rith stands with the people of Canada and our thoughts and prayers go out to the soldier’s family and friends.

“Death of Klinghoffer” Promotes an Offensive and Indefensible Political PositionB’nai B’rith International has issued the following statement: B’nai B’rith International is dismayed that the Metropolitan Opera in New York will run as scheduled “The Death of Klinghoffer.” This 1991 American opera glorifies the Palestine Liberation Front terrorists who hijacked the Achille Lauro cruise ship in 1985 and murdered American tourist Leon Klinghoffer. This piece seeks moral equivalence between terrorists and their victims. “The Death of Klinghoffer,” which is really about the murder of Mr. Klinghoffer, crosses all lines of artistic expression and promotes an offensive and indefensible position. When the Met’s schedule was announced earlier this year, B’nai B’rith International President Allan J. Jacobs and Executive Vice President Daniel S. Mariaschin expressed the organization’s concern to Metropolitan Opera General Manager Peter Gelb, articulating our shock at the utter lack of sensitivity in choosing to stage this opera. Click here to read the letter. The Metropolitan Opera’s large audience gives this piece marked by anti-Semitism, which promotes a tolerance of those who carry out acts of terror, an unprecedented public platform. Responding to a letter from CAMERA, the Committee for Accuracy in Middle East Reporting, Metropolitan Opera General Manager Peter Gelb wrote of the composer: “… he tried to understand the hijackers and their motivations, and to look for humanity in the terrorists, as well as in their victims.” Humanity in the terrorists? These men shot and killed a wheelchair-bound 69-year old man and dumped his body overboard. What’s to understand? At a time when the world is hyper-vigilant about the ever-growing threat of terrorism from so many global pockets, “The Death of Klinghoffer’s” glorification of terrorism stands out more than ever as an example of cultural folly.

Popular commerce website Etsy recently went on the record to ban some offensive items, citing its policy of not allowing “content on our site that demeans people based upon race, ethnicity, religion, gender, gender identity, disability, or sexual orientation.” Yet, Etsy is inconsistent in enforcing its own policies. B’nai B’rith International is disturbed to learn that the site still readily sells swastika and anti-Semitic paraphernalia. When B’nai B’rith checked the site in recent days, 456 swastika-themed items were available for sale, as were 479 Hitler-themed items, 13 Ku Klux Klan-themed items, and one racist, Jewish caricature candlestick listed specifically under the topic “anti-Semitic.” Etsy is not the only culprit of such practices: Ebay has also been repeatedly caught allowing the auction of hate-themed items, despite having an extensive policy banning offensive material. Additionally, Amazon, Sears Marketplace and Yahoo! have sold hate materials on their websites. It is incumbent on these sites to abide by their own policies and police the sale of offensive items. B’nai B’rith condemns the sale of these disgusting and hate-filled objects and demands Etsy and other businesses remove the aforementioned items from their stores and stay vigilant against additional offensive materials from appearing on their sites again.

B’nai B’rith International decries the vandalism of a mosque in a West Bank town near Nablus by suspected extremists in an apparent “price tag” attack on the night of Oct. 13. Incendiaries were thrown into the mosque, located in Akraba, through a broken window, torching the insides, while the attackers spray-painted the outside of the building with the words “price tag,” the mark of a small fringe of Jewish extremists who target property belonging to Arabs and sometimes the Israel Defense Forces. This act of intolerance, rightly deplored by Israeli President Reuven Rivlin, has no place in a democratic society. B’nai B’rith is confident that the Israeli authorities will launch a full investigation into the matter, and that the perpetrators will be apprehended and tried.

B’nai B’rith International is disappointed that the British Parliament’s House of Commons voted to symbolically urge government recognition of a Palestinian state in a 247-12 vote on Oct. 13. More than half, however, of the 650 legislators in the House of Commons absented themselves from the vote. While the vote does not provide official British recognition of an independent Palestinian state, this misguided and premature decision only serves to encourage Palestinians to pursue their political goals without bilateral negotiations and compromise with Israel. British Prime Minister David Cameron must ensure that the parliamentary motion does not prejudice his government’s foreign policy. The vote defies insistence by the international Quartet for Middle East peace—of which the European Union is a member and former British Prime Minister Tony Blair is the special envoy—that resolution of Palestinian-Israeli disputes be achieved only through direct negotiations between the parties. The British legislators’ vote does nothing to aid these talks and ignores the fact that a part of the Palestinian territories remains controlled by Hamas, a terrorist organization openly sworn to Israel’s destruction.

B’nai B’rith International has issued the following statement: B’nai B’rith International condemns U.N. Secretary-General Ban Ki-moon for attributing the 50-day summer hostilities between Israel and Hamas to “a restrictive occupation that has lasted almost half a century” while speaking at the Cairo conference on reconstruction in Gaza on Oct. 12. Ban said “we must not lose sight of the root causes of the recent hostilities: a restrictive occupation that has lasted almost half a century, the continued denial of Palestinian rights and the lack of tangible progress in peace negotiations.”‎ The secretary-general should refrain from making biased, inflammatory remarks perpetuating a false image of Israel as an occupying aggressor. Ban, in his comments, did make mention of Hamas rocket attacks that were “fired indiscriminately causing fear, panic and suffering.” However, he does not account for anti-Israel terrorists’ role in igniting and sustaining conflict—a stunning and inexplicable omission. Israel completely withdrew from Gaza in 2005, just as it did in Sinai after reaching a peace treaty with Egypt. In return for leaving Gaza, Israel received intensified attacks and threats against its citizenry. Israel has also repeatedly offered Palestinian statehood and the provision of all of Palestinians’ needs in sweeping peace offers—but these have been declined without fail by the Palestinian Authority leadership. Hamas, for its part, is doctrinally committed to the total destruction of the Jewish state. Combating other Islamist groups, like ISIS, while ignoring or handing propaganda victories to ones like Hamas is unconscionable and no service to advancing Palestinian-Israeli peace. The open fanaticism, terrorism and armament of Arab extremists is the patent “root cause” of recurring conflict with Israel.